been with civilians at a beer-drink in the very village from which I had seen so many people running. I had been mistaken in thinking these were all innocent civvies, thereby losing the chance of diverting the helicopters and troops onto a good opportunity target.
This, my first attempt at directing jets by airborne FAC, had worked better for the jet pilots than any one of many GAC strikes made over-border in support of SAS operations. The secret to success in first-run strikes under FAC control lay in four basic factors. These were, good timing, minimal radio chatter, excellent visual markers at target centre and control by a pilot who knew the precise location and extremities of the target and had witnessed the placement of each aircraft’s strike.
Air Staff was not put off by the absence of terrorists; rather it commented that this strike had proven that airborne FAC could provide consistent precision and allow jets to strike closer to troops and civilians than had previously been considered possible.
The face of terrorism
HAVING ESTABLISHED THEMSELVES WITH THE locals, ZANLA realised they had, at last, entered into a decisive phase which they named the ‘New Chimurenga’ war. The first Chimurenga had been the Mashona Rebellion of 1896. During that rebellion, the BSA Company executed the leading
Mbuya (grandmother) Nehanda was a frail old woman but her guidance was considered of paramount importance to ZANU and its military wing ZANLA. To ensure her safety and to allow her total freedom to communicate with the original Nehanda, she was carried by stretcher all the way through Tete to a camp known as Chifombo on the Zambian border. From this place she gave ZANLA commanders the encouragement they needed when proceeding southbound for Rhodesia. The old
By mid-1973 terrorism was spreading southward at an alarming rate and the names of three particular ZANLA regional leaders were on everyone’s lips. They were James Bond, Mao and Rex Nhongo. We were particularly keen to eliminate James Bond and Mao who were responsible for horrifying acts of brutality designed to put fear in the hearts of black people. They were eventually killed in 1974, whereas Rex Nhongo left Rhodesia and survived to become ZANLA’s commander at the end of the war.
Gone were the days when tracker-combat groups could relentlessly follow and destroy terrorist groups before they reached the black population. Gone too were the days when locals reported the presence of terrorists. At first some tribesmen did not understand the terrorists’ determination to fight for ‘freedom’ and ‘the vote’. So far as they were concerned, it seemed an awful waste of time and life to fight for something they could not eat, drink, smoke or poke. But when promised that they would inherit European farms, equipment and cattle, ZANLA’s objectives made a great deal more sense. Political indoctrination was not the whole reason for tribesmen failing to report the presence of terrorists; it was more to do with having become more afraid of ZANLA than the forces of government; and with good reason.
For anyone suspected of being a ‘sell-out’ (informer) to the SF, terrorist retribution was swift and cruel. Too often this gave rise to misinformation by opportunists who, having a grudge against another and knowing terrorists never bothered to check out any accusation, deliberately and wrongfully reported them as ‘sell-outs’. However, even wrongful killing of this nature fitted well enough with ZANLA’s campaign of terror.
Atrocities committed against the people, their livestock and possessions were widely reported in the media with graphic photographs of destruction, murder and maiming. Whereas the international community chose to ignore these horrors, the mindless slaughter of innocents angered urban blacks and the entire white community.
I saw the poor woman whose husband was killed in her presence before the gang leader cut off his ears, nose and fingers. The wife was then forced to cook and devour the grizzly items. No pity was shown when she retched and vomited; she was beaten until she retained even that which she had thrown up.
Another woman was flown in for medical attention. Her entire top lip had been cut away from back molars via her nose with electrician’s side-cutters.
The naked body of a young woman was found staked to the ground, arms and legs outstretched on ropes that were pegged into the ground. A blood-covered maize cob remained imbedded in her vagina as well as a thick burning pole that had been driven into her rectum to cause her an indescribably painful death in a very lonely place.
In many cases the use of burning poles driven into women’s vaginas and men’s rectums was done in the presence of villagers who witnessed such horrifying murder that they dared not report the atrocities for fear of becoming victims themselves. Whole herds of cattle were slaughtered with automatic gunfire or were hamstrung, necessitating their destruction by government agencies.
The term ‘terrorist’ was entirely justified for cowardly leaders of ZANLA gangs who wantonly brutalised hundreds of hapless civilians; yet the international community called them ‘guerrillas’. These bullies, though intent on murdering white farmers, lacked the courage to achieve the levels sought by their ZANU politicos. Night attacks on white farmers mounted but the casualties and damage caused was so much lower than might have occurred if undertaken by men of courage. ZANLA could intimidate their black brethren but not the white folk. There were many instances of a farmer and his wife fighting off the most determined of terrorist forces, usually in excess of fifteen men, because the terrorists could not match their sheer guts and determination. Yet a mere handful of terrorists could have hundreds of tribesmen cowering from the simplest of verbal threats.
In the course of moving around their farms and out on the country roads, farmers and their families needed to be prepared and armed to face the ever-present threat of landmines and ambush. Incredibly, very few farmers abandoned their farms because of these dangers. The vast majority stubbornly refused to be intimidated, as ZANLA had been assured they would. Most children attended boarding schools and were brought home to the farms for their holidays. Every effort was made to keep farming life as normal as possible and many incredible stories can be told of the community that bore the brunt of the war against whites.
One Centenary farmer received a hand-written note from the leader of a particular terrorist gang asking him not to allow his daughters to ride their horses on an adjacent farm where their safety could not be guaranteed. So long as they rode on their own farm they would be safe. It seems the farmer in question was popular with his workers whereas the farmer on the adjacent farm was not.
Amongst Christians there were stories of divine intervention. One of these emanated from a captured terrorist who explained why his especially large group abandoned their planned attack of a farmstead. He said the attack was aborted when, upon arrival at the farmstead, many armed men dressed in illuminated white clothes and riding white horses surrounded the place; yet not one horseman had been present that night.
ZANLA recruitment
